Toyota's engineers are looking at a car that would eliminate crashes. According to a video posted online by the Japanese company, a prototype Lexus LS car is decked out with various sensors on the front grill, rear wheels and the roof. Lasers point at the roof's censors and through reflections from the car manage to map out an accurate image of the car's surroundings complete with depth information that would be unavailable from a camera. Toyota's technology is described as an "Intelligent Transport System" (ITS).

The technology is designed to be used in conjunction with a driver, but the car can control itself.

Audi is due to demonstrate a self-parking car at CES, the Wall Street Journal said on Friday.

Nissan has already unveiled a prototype car that could park itself, while Sweedish Volvo is working on a vehicle system that allows cars to automatically follow one another on long stretches of highway.

Alongside Google in Silicon Valley, Stanford University has also developed a prototype self-driving car.